Details

Rockfire Grill is a hamburger restaurant in Mission Viejo. It’s discombobulating at first: The music is reggae; the food is American; and the owner, who’s originally from Mumbai, also owns Tangy Tomato, a Chinese Indian restaurant in Artesia’s Little India. But sink your teeth into the base-model cheeseburger Raj Syal sells for $5, and you get it. It bursts juice and sauce. The beef is twice as thick as In-N-Out’s, charred in the right places, and also wonderfully misshapen as though someone in the back formed the patties by hand. Fancy salad greens, tomatoes, grilled onions, mayo, mustard and ketchup are embraced along with the meat by the clamshell of a two-fisted flatbread baked to order with the same profile as those pork belly buns New York’s Momofuku made famous. And it turns out this shape is perfectly suited to catch all the escaping burger juices as though it were engineered to do so.

Get the Things to Do Newsletter

Sign up for our weekly guide to events in Orange County, and never be bored again. With suggestions for every day of the week, our recommendations will keep you busy on any budget.

Related Stories (1)

At first, Rockfire Grill is discombobulating. The music is reggae; the food is American; and the owner is originally from Mumbai and also owns the Tangy Tomato, a Chinese Indian restaurant in Artesia's Little India. That Raj Syal no...